Quick reference guide to the formats available to view the ad server list

Note Benny (Bennet? Bennay? Ben, Nay?, Né, Ben, Né)

This is just a quick reference. Please see the main page and the news archive for full details. There's also a handy dandy form for choosing a format available on main page. And some other pages.

If you'd like a new format added, let me know. Most of the formats were suggested by other people - which also means that if things aren't exactly right it's probably not my fault; again, mail me me with corrections.

Also: possible values in <angle brackets> aren't real possible values - read the description to see what you actually use.

sets whether a short intro to the list is displayed at the top to explain what the person is looking at (automatically set to false for some of the formats where text at the top of the page would break things)

sets the IP address used when viewing the list as a HOSTS file or any other format using a specific IP address

default value:

127.0.0.1

→

the localhost IP address, used by most HOSTS files

possible value:

10.0.0.1

→

private but valid IP address

possible value:

192.168.0.0.1

→

another private but valid IP address

possible value:

198.41.0.4

→

valid IP address (for a.root-servers.net)

possible value:

0.0.0.1

→

invalid IP address; shortens the length of the list and solves some problems caused by browsers who throw errors after failing to contact localhost; however, also causes problems with other applications who try to resolve the IP and fail

(NB: PHP array) specifies the date from which to view additions or updates to the list of ad servers; day, month, and year can be set with the current date's day, month, or year being used if unspecied

my personal method of using the list of ad servers because it's easy to set up, easy to block whole zones (eg, all hostnames under doubleclick.net instead of each individual one), and on a local network it's incredibly easy to set up a new machine to start blocking ads - just change the nameserver

one of the most common ways of blocking ads with a list of ad servers, very easy to implement but not the most efficient or effective; however, a good way to start (see the main page for a quick guide to using the list in this way)

can be used to automatically configure your browser to ignore images located on servers appearing in the list of ad servers; the list can be copied in this format to a local location (faster, but needs updating) or you can set your browser to load it from pgl.yoyo.org every time you start (slower, always up to date)